


the light that never fails

by archons



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Future, Cuddling & Snuggling, Fluff, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, One Shot Collection, Rough Beginnings, Trans Male Character, Trans Pregnancy, Unplanned Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-21
Updated: 2017-12-26
Packaged: 2018-10-08 16:24:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 13,942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10390953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/archons/pseuds/archons
Summary: Aithlin Ghilain never meant to fall for Tevinter nobility, but for all his agility, there was no avoiding the outcome that found him.





	1. vandal aria

**Author's Note:**

> This is a collection of oneshots about my Inquisitor, Aithlin of Clan Ghilain, and Dorian Pavus.

The melted snow in Aithlin’s sandals made it difficult to take stairs and made climbing them without twisting his face into a horrible frown impossible. He tugged at the tattered silk that trailed through the slush behind him, clutching at fistfuls to keep their poor condition from worsening. How anyone could enjoy this sort of weather- the constant snow flurries, the inescapable chill- he hardly knew. But when he passed Solas on the way to apothecary’s hut, the elf wasn’t frowning. Not like him.

Casting a sideways glance across the fat-bellied jars of pitch, he saw that Dorian wasn’t frowning, either. On the contrary, he looked almost radiant with his chin tilted up towards the sky and the sun warming his skin. 

He’d changed into something more comfortable since arriving. Josephine had offered him one of her cloaks, and Aithlin saw that he still wore it clasped around his neck. The fur was dense and dark, almost black, and it suited him. It was obvious in the cast of his expression that he was well-aware of that fact.

Aithlin’s hackles rose, knowing very well how terrible he looked. The cold wilted him, leaving his petals pale and curled, his roots frozen. Pulling his many layers closer to his chest, he almost had a foot into Adan’s tent when he heard a throat cleared from his left, rather than his right. 

Not Solas, but Dorian.

Without looking in his direction or taking a single step back, Aithlin’s hand curled at the door’s frame. “If you want my attention, use your words. Don’t clear your throat at me and expect me to take any notice of you.”

Even without looking him in the face, Dorian’s slow smile could be heard in his voice. He sounded warm. Comfortable. “But you already have.”

“It was a warning.”

No smart comment followed. Aithlin made a silent note of that, but still refused to turn. Not before Dorian budged. Not before Dorian reached out and made an offer. Only then would he get the attention he wanted.

Expecting such was not asking for the world.

“I’d like to talk to you.”

Aithlin turned towards him. “Was that so difficult?”

Dorian’s laugh was infectious. It spread a smile on Aithlin’s face against his better judgement, and he moved over to him on his slippery sandals. He cradled the tattered peach silk around his thighs, though his grip loosened in the warmth of the sun.

“Sorry.” And, leaning in as if explaining an inside joke, Dorian said, “It’s a hard habit to break.”

His small smile grew smaller still before disappearing altogether.

“What?”

The sharpness of the question hit Dorian with an immediate recognition of his misstep. That much was evident in his expression, in the whites of his eyes almost doubling, in his quick proclamation of, “I meant nothing by that, of course.”

“You meant nothing by it,” Aithlin repeated. He spoke slowly, dicing the words on the tip of his tongue in vaguely accented common. 

Anyone else might have taken a step forward. They might have pulled their shoulders back to make themselves seem broader. They might have poked a finger into his chest or dipped their face close to his. They might have threatened him. Slapped him. Punched him, knuckles-first, not caring if their hand split in two.

But Aithlin was not someone else.

“Use my name.” His brows rose. Buried somewhere in his soft voice, there was a threat, but it was not a threat of physical violence. “I’ll not have a shem clear their throat at me, as if my attention is already theirs to have.”

Dorian’s lips parted. Skin slid over his tensing jaw. It was the look of a man who had a dozen things to say and none of the words necessary to say them.

Time passed. Snowflakes landed on Aithlin’s pale hair, white on ivory, and melted. Josephine’s cloak lined with fox’s fur billowed in the wind. The Breach shuddered and spat vibrant shards of green down to the earth. And Dorian found his words.

“Might we… begin again?”

Again, Aithlin’s brows rose. He waited.

“Aithlin…” Dorian shifted on his feet. He was the one who pulled his shoulders back, but it was not in an attempt to seem larger. If anything, the change in his posture was made to seem more stable. More confident. Surer of his desire to make things work. “I made a genuine mistake, and I’d like to clear the air between us.”

Pulling at the fabric draped over his broad hips, Aithlin pulled it closer again, and he tilted his chin upwards, looking Dorian in his eyes. “I never want to hear you call me by anything but my name. Do we have an understanding?”

The mage’s recovery was quick. “Nothing but your name? Surely there are things…”

“Nothing.”

With that, Aithlin took a step back and turned towards the apothecary’s cabin. The face of the building had two shuttered windows, and one slammed shut when he turned around. Behind it, there was a great deal of rustling and whispers.

A flush of embarrassment rose up the back of his neck, leaving him pinkened and frowning anew.

He glanced in Dorian’s direction once more only to see him standing there, waiting for whatever it was he would say. There was an almost boyish look of anticipation on his face that only sent another flicker of heat into Aithlin’s cheeks.

“Once I’m finished… with Adan,” he began, hands knotting the silk, knuckles paling to white. “Once I finish, we’ll… talk.”

Before Dorian could say a word, Aithlin was inside Adan’s cabin.


	2. dawn lotus

Following a crash of lightning and a roll of thunder, Aithlin cast his eyes towards the ceiling. The wooden panels held under the sudden early winter storm with minimal shuddering and dripping. That was a comfort, at least, as were the few rooms rented out for the Inquisitor and his party. 

At the first sign of rain, the four of them turned back around at the gates of Redcliffe village. Solas, wiping the top of his head clean. Cole, curious as to why everyone was so bothered as rain dripped from the wide brim of his hat. Aithlin, eyeing Dorian. And Dorian, tense of back and jaw, weary, uninterested in weathering the storm in the same tavern as his father.

Once they returned to the Gull and Lantern, Aithlin found his way to the counter and asked to reserve three rooms for the night. Surely, there were some free. Nice ones. Comfortable ones. The hour was early, and the tavern’s usual patrons were abed, nursing hangovers and whoever they’d taken home.

The tavern’s proprietor grinned at his own fortune and raised the price to, “Five gold, each. For the night.”

Fifteen sovereigns exchanged hands, and the four of them were escorted up the stairs to their bedrooms by the gracious tavern owner. He remembered clearly the pained look in Dorian’s eyes when he asked, “Could you… give me the room farthest away from anyone else? I would appreciate it.”

The man arched a brow at the request, knowing things had gone awry given that he’d heard all of it, and showed Dorian to a room at the very end of the hallway.

An hour had passed since Aithlin cast off his traveling leathers and wrapped himself up in something much more familiar. His costume of stolen samite and fur was as much a comfort as the roof above his head and the closeness of his bow. 

It was a second skin.

Another crack of lightning shocked a gasp out of him and forced him to hunker down deeper into the mess of fabric to guard his ears against the next.

The world outside of the shuttered windows was milk. There was no seeing farther than the tip of your nose in this kind of storm. Just rain and more rain, occasionally brightening to white in the wake of a lightning strike. 

They were stuck, the four of them. And while Solas and Cole would be content conversing with each other, neither he nor Dorian had that kind of advantage.

Resolving to survive the storm in the company of another person rather than on his own, Aithlin stood, gathered his clothes around himself, and left the lonely, wet room for the lonely, wet room at the end of the long hallway.

He felt a nervous twinge in his stomach the moment he slowed to a stop in front of the door, but even that didn’t keep him from knocking.

When the bedroom’s sole inhabitant didn’t shout for him to go away, he let himself in. 

“What kind of self-respecting village only has one tavern?” were the first words out of Dorian’s mouth, thick with whatever it was he was drinking straight from the carafe. He passed his tongue over his thick bottom lip before setting his drink down on the table beside his chair.

Aithlin shut the door quietly behind him.

His explanation was just as soft, as if he worried he might disturb him still. “Redcliffe is small enough to need just the one.”

“If there is one thing I don’t need, it’s your logic while I’m busy being…” He gestured vaguely towards middle distance. There was a tension around his mouth and around his eyes that was wholly unfamiliar to Aithlin. It changed his entire face. Made him look older. “Miserable.”

A lengthy silence passed between them. There were no more words, just the roar of the storm outside the Gull and Lantern’s strong walls.

Thumbing over a sash’s golden tassel, Aithlin’s eyes rose from the brocaded fabric to Dorian’s eyes to find that he was staring at him expectantly. The forgotten twinge of nerves was replaced by a quickening heartbeat.

“Do you not like the rain?”

Whatever tension sat at the corners of Dorian’s eyes eased. Aithlin saw the change in him and quickly realized it was more than just the muscles in his face relaxing. It was comfort. Relief, even. And the was the culprit.

“I think I’d have preferred it if some hired brute tried to club me over the head and haul me back to my father.”

Elbows planted on his knees, Dorian’s head sank. Defeat was written across the slouch of his shoulders, but in his curled fingers, there was a measure of defiance. In his voice, even broken into pieces as it was, there was a refusal to give in to the misery he’d sipped for an hour’s time. “Seeing how desperate he was…”

Aithlin took a step forward. The soft soles of his sandals barely made a noise against the floor’s uneven paneling. He drew himself down, down onto his knees, and looked up into Dorian’s down-turned face.

“I don’t understand Tevinter,” he said, reaching out, resting tapered fingers lightly on Dorian’s forearms. “I don’t understand how your people live. I don’t understand their politics or their prejudices. I don’t understand how a man can love his son, but not… love his son at the same time. It doesn’t make any sense to me.”

Dorian laughed. It was short and humorless. “It doesn’t make sense to any of us, honestly.”

“The way I see it, your father loves his son.” Aithlin curled his fingers into Dorian’s sleeves, holding him still, lending him his support in every way he could think to show it. “But he doesn’t understand that to love truly someone, you have to love every part of them.”

That time, Dorian didn’t laugh. He stared down at Aithlin with red-rimmed eyes and lips swollen from chewing, and he let go of a breath that shook every part of him.

Without a thought, Aithlin rose up higher onto his knees, hands leaving Dorian’s forearms in favor of curling his arms around his neck and holding his body as close to his as he could manage in their position. 

He felt wet lashes against his throat when Dorian tucked his face down into the curve of his neck. He felt trembling hands digging into the layers of his clothes to find purchase where he could. He felt Dorian give himself over to weakness. 

In that moment, he felt as if he was holding a boy, as if he was comforting someone small and afraid.

“You’ve mentioned time and again that you want to change your home, to make it better,” Aithlin said, voice barely louder than a whisper as he brushed his fingers through the shorn hair at the nape of Dorian’s neck. “So, once you’re done here, go back. Change it. Make sure that no one else has to hurt the way you have.”

Dorian drew in a slow breath. Again, he sighed, shutting his eyes against the bare skin of Aithlin’s neck. “Can one man change all of that? Sometimes, I wonder.”

“You aren’t alone in it,” Aithlin murmured. His knees ached against the grain of the wood, but he refused to move from that spot. There would be no drawing back, no pulling away. “There must be others who have suffered in similar ways. Men and women alike. If you get their attention, I have no doubt that they will help you make those changes.”

It was Dorian who broke the contact. It was Dorian who pulled away, head craned back, brow raised. His voice was strained and wet, but there was a familiar curl at the corner of his mouth.

“I’ve never heard you talk to anyone like this,” he said, and Aithlin’s hands snapped away from him, pulled instead to his chest where they twined into a velveteen shawl. “It’s just strange, that’s all. I was half-expecting a knife in the back.”

“I was comforting you.”

“I know, I know…” This time, when Dorian laughed, there was humor enough in the sound to coax a smile out of Aithlin, as well. “I’m grateful.”

Dorian leaned closer to him at the protest of his straw-bottomed chair.

“I genuinely can’t find the words to explain how much.”

While his breath smelled strongly of liquor, there was a newfound clarity in Dorian’s eyes. They were beautiful and stormy and so much closer than Aithlin had realized in the moments before their mouths touched.

There was a hunger on both sides- for comfort, for acceptance, for each other. With the movement of their hands and their lips, the desire for each was sated one after the other.

Dorian slipped a hand around to cup the nape of Aithlin’s neck, drawing him ever closer. Aithlin clutched at his clothes and all but lifted himself up off of the ground, away from his aching knees to sit on Dorian’s soft thighs. 

They struggled to get any closer than they already were. They struggled and fought to sit body to body, to belong to each other.

When the kiss broke, leaving them desperate for air, Dorian laughed again. This time, he sounded deliriously happy, and Aithlin buried his smile into his chest. Petting over the roots of Aithlin’s mussed braid, his laugh quieted to a chuckle. “Today has been a day, hasn’t it?”

“I can’t believe this happened.”

“It is rather unbelievable, isn’t it? Considering you hate me.”

The fingers resting on Dorian’s forearms closed into a vice, pinching his skin sharply and making the man give an embarrassingly loud shout. At his wounded expression, Aithlin scrunched his nose.

“I don’t hate you.”

Dorian rubbed at the tender skin of his arm. “Don’t you?”

There was another kiss, a would-be second kiss brushed over the warm skin of Dorian’s cheek. It left behind a deeper, altogether different sort of warmth.

“I don’t,” Aithlin whispered. “It would be easy, but I don’t.”

Before he knew it, there were arms around his waist. They goaded him closer, pulling all of his weight onto the straw-bottomed chair. A long time had passed since the last time Aithlin had been held. A year, perhaps a year and some months.

He wondered how long it had been for Dorian.

“I think that’s a lie.”

Aithlin shook his head, pale lashes against pink cheeks. “i don’t lie.”

“May I have another kiss?”

The question opened Aithlin’s eyes slowly, and when he looked to Dorian, he saw everything. There were so many different colors in his eyes, on his skin, in his hair. He was vibrant and lovable, and Aithlin’s heart ached with how much he wanted him.

He couldn’t hate him.

When Aithlin spoke, his voice was small. “You needn’t ask.”

It was a confession masked as permission, and Dorian took his words for what they represented rather than asking again.

I trust you not to take advantage.

Or, simply, I trust you.


	3. spindleweed

At Skyhold, word traveled on wings.

Dorian’s lips were _warm_. His hands moved with learned ease. So much of his lover was different from what he was used to, and he found that he enjoyed those differences. Not that it stopped Aithlin from squirming away when he went too far or grasped too tightly.

It took some time and some tentative practice as they traveled back to the Keep from Redcliffe village, but Aithlin was getting used to the brush of his mustache. The practice of stealing kisses in corners was more difficult to learn.

A piercing raven’s cry forced Dorian a step back with a shout of, “Vishante kaffas!” 

He wheeled around as the bird took flight and left behind only a feather or three as evidence. Urgency drove it upwards, spiriting to Leliana in order to whisper the truth of what it’d seen with it’s small, black eyes to the Inquisitor’s spymaster.

“I was hoping to avoid an audience,” Dorian said as he rubbed a hand over his bare chest.

“It was only bird.”   


Aithlin leaned in and kissed over the roundest part of Dorian’s chin.

* * *

“So… you and Sparkler, huh?”

Aithlin’s face nearly exploded with warm beer at the question. At the question’s implications. At _Varric_ , damn him. Instead, he choked the drink back and wiped his mouth with his long sleeve. Maybe if he ignored him…

Varric tapped the nib of his pen to the inkwell at his side. “You don’t have to give me any details, but I figured it was something you’d tell me.” 

The corner of his mouth slipped into a smile.

“I had to hear it from _Josephine_. Can you imagine?”  


“Josephine knows!?”

Every soul in the Keep’s main chamber twisted around and stared at the Inquisitor and his companion. There was an immediate hum of gossip when they looked away, satisfied to come up with stories on their own rather than waiting for a response. They knew they wouldn’t get one, not from the tight-lipped Dalish elf who rarely gave any of them a second look.

“All that matters,” Varric began as he signed his name with a flourish at the bottom of a quickly written letter, “is that he makes you happy.”  


Aithlin’s fingers curled around his cup.

“Does he?”

“I suppose he does.”  


Varric frowned. “That isn’t an answer.”

“I just need time.” Aithlin shook his head and a mess of blonde hair fell around his flushed cheeks. He hated this. He hated not knowing what to say. He hated pushing everything down in order to wait, to wait for Dorian, to wait for **_himself_**. “To… figure out if he does.”  


* * *

Dorian shifted on his stool in the Herald’s Rest. Discomfort was scrawled down his rigid spine. He preferred drinking alone, for the quiet rather than the privacy, but after finishing off his last bottle of red with Aithlin only a few nights before, he had reached the threshold of desperation. Throats deserved to be wet, and his was parched from worries and devious little thoughts.

There were eyes on him, he knew. The pairs numbered well past a dozen. Closer to twenty from his last count and the last sweep of his narrowed eyes around the open room.

The Chargers accounted for most of them. Their numbers had flourished since joining the Inquisition, and they were only egged on by Iron Bull, who stared at Dorian from across the room with the most frustrating smile he’d ever seen.

He tipped the glass back, draining the remaining mouthful with flourish before setting the thick crystal base down onto the counter. 

“Another?”  


“Another,” Dorian echoed, nostrils flaring.  


A hand settled on his shoulder almost as firmly as he’d set down the glass. He didn’t have to turn to know who it was. Only one man in the Rest could make him feel so swallowed up with only a gesture.

Dorian waited. 

He waited for Cabot to pour him another glass of wine before looking up at Iron Bull with a withering stare. “ **What** is it?”  


“We don’t see you in here often, is all.”

Giving his shoulder a less-than-gentle pat, Bull settled down on the stool next to him. The seat’s wooden legs seemed none too happy about that. He was a large man with an intimidating set of horns and a _loud_ voice. So loud.

Without waiting for Dorian to respond, Bull leaned an elbow against the bar. “How’s Aithlin?”  


Dorian’s lips pinched into a pucker.

“Oh, shit. Lels wasn’t lying, huh?” Bull’s laugh was louder than his speaking voice, and to Dorian, it was nails against stone. “Isn’t he a little too… y’know, feisty for you?”

Lifting his freshly filled glass, Dorian turned his attention to Cabot, who was watching all of this happen with an expression that was split between annoyance and interest. He rarely pried into the business of others, but this tempted him. Because of _course_  it did.

“I’ll have this returned,” Dorian told him, nodding towards the glass, before rising from his stool and leaving the Herald’s Rest without another word to the qunari.  


* * *

When they met that night, they didn’t meet with a kiss.

The first fragile words out of Aithlin’s mouth were, “Everyone knows.”

“I know.”  


His hands curled into the soft sleeves of the tunic Dorian wore, keeping him at arm’s length, staring at the dip of his collar rather than into his eyes. “You know,” Aithlin whispered. His lips stood out from his skin, red and swollen from chewing. “They weren’t supposed to know. We were so careful, and yet-”

“And yet…” Dorian’s voice was warm, and his own hands moved up Aithlin’s forearms with no small amount of caution. “I’m here, aren’t I?”  


“Not to put an end to this?”

“Aithlin…”  


When their eyes finally met, Aithlin saw instability in Dorian’s eyes. They were just as confused and afraid as his no doubt were. But, in an instant, they were warm again. His touch grew firm, pressing aside Aithlin’s grip in favor of wrapping him up in his arms.

Dorian pressed his mouth to the lobe of Aithlin’s ear. 

“Skyhold is not Tevinter,” he whispered. “Skyhold is not the Dales. Skyhold is Skyhold, and I believe Skyhold can be ours.”


	4. crystal grace

Dorian began leaving long before he left.

There were letters, of course- long letters spirited over long miles by Leliana’s ravens. But they were letters he couldn’t respond to, letters read by Josephine as Aithlin sat in her office with his chin to his knees and his down-turned ears nearly resting on his shoulders. _How would you like to respond?_ she asked, time and again.

And he responded every time with the same words, guilt-ridden and lonely down to his bones: _I don’t want to._

There was a conflict inside of him. Differing thoughts waged war, and each side was desperate to win his heart. There was pride in Dorian for traveling back into the heart of his homeland to plant the seed of rebellion. There was concern for the same reason. There was anger, too.

At night, anger was the strongest.

Curled up in his bed, a solitary shape in a sea of blankets with room enough for three or four, Aithlin’s thoughts of Dorian turned sour. There was no instant regret. There was no rush of shame. He laid there before sleep, and he tongued the words Dorian wrote to him against the roof of his mouth.

They were sweet, placating words, though they lost their meaning when dictated on a tuneful Antivan accent.

_ Am- _

_ Don’t… read that word. _

Aithlin’s brow furrowed against the soft planes of his pillowcase. He only ever wanted to know how that word sounded straight from Dorian’s mouth. So many of those words were lost to him already. When he traveled with Alendra, when they rode towards their destination and the conversation quieted down, he struggled to bring Dorian’s voice back to his ears.

The words were easy. He knew Dorian’s vocabulary and his turn of phrase. But his voice was more difficult to recall, given the weeks of Josephine and her delicate, winding way of reading aloud.

It was easy to hate their situation at night.

It was easy and quick.

But in the morning, when he woke alone and the length of bed beside him was at its coldest, Aithlin could not find his anger. He rose out of obligation. Dressed out of obligation. Tended to his hart out of obligation.

Dorian was not his entire life, but he colored it. He brought life and laughter and love into it. He reminded Aithlin that even after everything he could live it.

Time wore on.

Letters came and were read.

And Dorian returned.

Rumors of their attachment to each other were as common as they were understated. Few in Skyhold truly knew of what there was between them until the first time Dorian returned to Skyhold after months away.

Dorian’s retinue was tired and drained of most of its color. Their horses needed food and water, and they required the same. A week or more of riding left them slouched and scorched from the sun. But at the head of the group, Dorian rode high in his saddle, anticipation written clearly on his face.

There was a sudden cry from the Keep’s heaviest doors.

Everyone in the yard looked up from their work or conversation to see a streak of blonde hair and pale blue silk darting down the stairs and across the muddy ground to the men on their horses.

To Dorian.

He was still on his horse when Aithlin came to a stop at his side. The blonde head rested on his knee. While his riding leathers were dusty from the road, that changed nothing. All it took was a kiss to wipe away the dirt, for gray became black again.

Dorian rested his hand atop Aithlin’s head, brushing his gloved fingers through the mess of white-gold.

“Let me see you?”

The request left him as a strained question, but rather than clearing his throat and repeating his question, Dorian let it rest. There was no use in tarnishing the moment, in stripping away its sincerity. And when Aithlin turned his head up to look at him, Dorian saw that his eyes were wet and glad, and he was glad, too.

Aithlin gripped at the knee of his trousers, tugging at him with a murmured, “Get off of your horse.”

It was barely loud enough to be heard over the rising volume of the crowd.

People flocked around romance. It was another story to tell, another memory to hold close, or another bitter thing to cling onto. Discovering that rumors were true only brought them closer, and for once in his life, Aithlin was oblivious to the attention of humans. He didn’t care for them; he only cared for Dorian in that moment, looking so tired and excited at the same time, staring down at him from atop his horse with the midday sun at his back.

Rather than dismounting, Dorian leaned down, closer to him, and snatched his lips up in a kiss. It was as brief as it was chaste. Still, the brush of those familiar lips left Aithlin red-cheeked and smiling.

A gasp ran through those gathered around them.

One stranger- or perhaps Iron Bull- gave a piercing, congratulatory whistle.

Aithlin’s smile didn’t falter when Dorian led his horse towards the stables. It grew.

That afternoon, when they were finally alone, Dorian pulled something from his robes and tucked it against the curve of Aithlin’s rough palm.

The metal was warm against his skin from being held so close to Dorian’s body, but the crystal itself was strangely cool. Curious fingertips brushed the marbled surface of the polished stone, marveling at its sharp edges and its sage and ivory coloring. Deep within the crystal, there were flecks of gold. The light loved those.

“What is it?” Aithlin asked, glancing up at him. He wore a small smile, softened from the previous one though it was no less precious. “A… token? Something for me to remember you by when you’re gone?”

Dorian pressed his lips together. “Not  _really_. Of course, there is a certain sentimental value, but-”

At Aithlin’s quirked brow, he laughed. “It’s a sending crystal. My good friend Maeveris helped me imbue it with an experimental sort of magic.”

Reaching into the neck of his robes, Dorian drew out a similar crystal strung with a thin golden chain. The shape of his was similar, but not perfectly alike. They were likely mined from the same vein. Brothers.

“They are used for communication,” he explained. “The main goal of my trip was to fetch them. I wanted so badly to surprise you…”

Aithlin lifted the crystal to his mouth. “You have.”

His voice echoed out from the crystal Dorian held, and surprise overtook him. Not surprise that it worked, but surprise that this sort of magic even existed. Knowing he would be able to talk with Dorian even while he was so far away…

Pulling the crystal away from his lips to admire its coloring in the light, Aithlin blinked back the sudden rush of emotion. “It’s beautiful.”

“You are.”

Again, Aithlin blinked. He clutched the sending crystal to his chest and gave a wet, relieved laugh of his own. He knew that Dorian loved him. He _knew_. But to hold it in his hands was something else entirely. “I’m sorry for not writing.”

Dorian silenced him with another kiss.

The following spring, Dorian left for Tevinter again at Maevaris Tilani’s insistence. He packed up everything in the wake of the Winter Palace and left with the same group of men as before. This time, things were different. This time, he was at the foot of the Frostbacks when he heard a soft, “Dorian?” at his throat.

He nearly turned back around. He nearly rode back up the mountains just to fall into his man’s arms. He wanted to be _home_.

But he couldn’t turn back, and Aithlin knew that, tucked beneath his blankets and ready for sleep. They would both spend the night alone and wake alone. They would live, alone, for weeks on end. But this time, things were different.

Pressing his lips to the sending stone’s golden cradle, Aithlin whispered, “Say the word.”

And across miles and miles, he heard him, and his voice was fresh in his mind.

“Amatus.”


	5. royal elfroot

Sunday mornings were always the busiest.

“Ma,” Aithlin mouthed against Dorian’s warm cheek. “Vhe,” he mouthed against the bridge of Dorian’s nose. “Nan,” he mouthed against Dorian’s mouth and smiled when he squirmed, unwilling to part from his sleep.  


“Renviel isn’t here to dress me,” Aithlin said as he slid one leg over the width of Dorian’s soft thighs. “I need your help with my hair.”  


Dorian’s whiskers twitched along with his nose. “I’m asleep.”

“I noticed.” 

Fingertips grazed light enough to tickle over the bare chest beneath them. Again, Dorian squirmed. This wasn’t going to be an easy morning, but it had been a long night. Meetings with the other Lucerni often ended just before first light. Empathy did its very best to convince Aithlin that he didn’t need the help. There was a struggle, but in the end, Empathy failed. 

His lips brushed over Dorian’s chin. When he spoke, they caught against his skin. “You’ve set the gold aside, haven’t you?”

“I always do,” Dorian said without even bothering to open his eyes.  


“Amatus…”  


His eyes opened.

Aithlin grinned at the sight. After years together, he knew each and every useful key to unlock Dorian’s attention. Never mind that Dorian was a simple sort of man whose weaknesses were his heart, his stomach, and his cock. He still enjoyed the flush of warmth that came from another successful lock picked.

Rather than asking again, Aithlin sat up from where he rested against Dorian’s chest and reached for the brush that sat on the bedside table.  


As he stretched, he felt a hands on the curve of his waist.

The hands were smooth, but solid. And curious, too, as they moved up his ribs to thumb over the soft skin beneath his breasts. When he didn’t flinch away or give Dorian a look of withering warning, the hands continued to explore, even after Aithlin dropped the heavy-backed brush onto his chest.

“I have–” His breath caught. “The seneschal–”  


Dorian clucked his tongue against the roof of his mouth as his hands curled around to Aithlin’s back, to his shoulders, to the sinuous curve of his spine. “Galius is a patient man,” he murmured. “And this isn’t our first Sunday spent abed.”

“Renviel says that Shiya’s mother is sick.” The suddenly serious edge to Aithlin’s voice caused the hands to slow. He looked to Dorian down the slope of his nose. Even with the morning light warming him at the edges, there was something intimidating about the elven man sitting astride his lover. “They could all use their pay.”  


Dorian tapped his fingers over Aithlin’s hips. Consideration manifested itself in the teeth that snatched up his bottom lip, in the slight furrow of his brow.

“Tell Shiya to bring her mother here,” he said. He sat up so suddenly that he nearly knocked Aithlin onto his ass, though he was quick to catch him and bring him in even closer than before. With his free hand, he reached for the brush between them and clutched onto its wooden handle. “Felven will see to her, happily. He’s very popular with older women.”  


“They think he’s cute, is all.”  


Dorian laughed. “There are benefits to being the youngest physician in Minrathous, I suppose.” He worked his tongue around in his mouth, still thinking, still finding ways to make the situation better. “Shiya works with the kitchen staff, doesn’t she? But only occasionally.”

“She is capable of doing anything.” Aithlin smiled. She was the first of many slaves he had freed from slavery and given good, paying work. Their household was staffed by humans and elves and dwarves alike, all former slaves and all protected by the Lucerni leader and his voidspawn of a lover. “But she only works in the kitchens when we are understaffed. Do you have something in mind?”

“I enjoy how sweet she makes the tarts.”

The bridge of Aithlin’s nose wrinkled with a smile, and he gave Dorian’s chest a gentle shove. “You would. They’ve all spoiled you.”

“We should ask her if she’s interested in becoming one of our cooks.”  


Aithlin pressed his lips together. His pleasure at the offer showed only in the color of his cheeks as they ripened to shades of pink. Pride came along with pleasure, hand-in-hand. There was something indescribable about how it felt to see Dorian scramble for a way to make an elf’s life so much **better**. Improvements were being made daily, and strides towards the outlawing of slavery in Tevinter were quickening, even at risk of tripping and falling _so far_.

“I think,” Aithlin whispered, so close to Dorian that the tips of their noses touched, “you ought to brush and braid my hair, and then… you should go to her and ask her yourself. That would make her the happiest.”  


“Will you bring the gold to Galius, then? While I speak to her?”

Nodding, Aithlin turned around in Dorian’s lap and offered him his long, white-blonde hair. 

Every Sunday morning was the busiest day of the week, and every Sunday morning began with brushed hair and a heavy sack of gold.


	6. glitterdust

“Arlathan.”

Curling a lock of white-blonde hair around his forefinger, Dorian murmured, “Antiva City,” into the quiet of their shared tent.

The camp outside was quiet, too, save for the crackle of a dying fire. It was the forest that spoke back to them through the tent’s thick red canvas—the quick clicking tune of grasshoppers, the trilling of a pair of song thrushes, the watery crash of a nearby river careening into a nearby lake. There was no such thing as silence in the Dales.

Aithlin shifted around to glance up at Dorian from where he rested his head on his lap. The steady, magical glow of their lamp outlined his face with pale blue, from his full cheek to the curve of his smiling lips. “Antiva City? Really? With all you have to say about Antivans?”

Dorian cleared his throat and dropped the curl in favor of fiddling with the blanket wrapped messily around them both. “I have a certain admiration for modern Antivan architecture.”  


Their eyes met in the almost-darkness, and Aithlin said, “Qarinus.”

“Chateau Dentelle.”  


Aithlin smiled again and shook his head. “It’s probably been retaken by now.” He let himself rest again on Dorian’s lap, busying himself with tracing over laces and buttons rather than thinking about the winter he spent at the chateau with his clan. The memories were bright and warm and triumphant, but he had no use for them anymore. “It was never ours to begin with.”

“Then…” Dorian worked his tongue around in his mouth, pursed his lips, and thought. “Clan Ghilain, wherever it may be.”  


Aithlin gave a snort of a laugh. 

“What?”  


“You hate the weather in Ferelden,” he said, softly, twining the laces of Dorian’s tunic around his fingers. “That’s where they were, last I heard from them.”  


“Given enough fur and the proper boots, I could stand to return to the place. My time in the Hinterlands wasn’t nearly as horrible as I expected it to be. The weather was mild, and the sun was warm. It’s Ferelden winters I have no stomach for.”  


Eyes shut from listening to him and mouth pressed to his stomach, muffling his words, Aithlin asked, “Do you like it here?”  


“Better the Dales than Emprise du Lion.” Dorian leaned back against the crate of supplies they’d altered to make a fitting half-chair. “I catch a chill every time I remember those _long_ weeks. Between the snow and the red lyrium, I thought I’d never rest.”  


“As I remember, we found ways to keep warm,” Aithlin murmured as he drew back to look up at him again. “And to distract you.”  


“Which will come in handy when we’re visiting your clan in Maker-forsaken wintry Ferelden.”  


Aithlin pulled himself up onto his knees with another quiet laugh. He shook his head and reached for the ribbon at the end of his braid. One tug, and the ribbon fell away, and his braid unwound itself into loose curls. “I have trouble imagining us fucking in an aravel,” he said as he arranged himself on Dorian’s lap rather than curled up at his side. “My Keeper wouldn’t be very impressed.”

“Wouldn’t he be?” Dorian tutted and gathered the layers of delicate fabric Aithlin wore into wrinkled bunches at his waist. “That’s disappointing.”  


Aithlin’s brows furrowed.

“So you… would?”  


“If you’re surprised that I would sleep with you while visiting with your clan…” Dorian let go of the clothes in his fists in favor of palming over Aithlin’s wide hips. ”I’ll have you remember how difficult it is for me to keep my hands off of you.”

Again, Aithlin shook his head. It wasn’t a disagreement; he knew Dorian was telling the truth. It was an attempt to dust away the thoughts that caused him to question in the first place. When he looked at him again, he saw that Dorian’s eyes were soft and entreating and as patient as they always were with him.

“You have no idea how much it means to me that you want us to see all of these places together.”  


“They are places I want to see,” Dorian explained. His palms shifted upwards from Aithlin’s hips to the small of his back to the dip between his shoulder blades, coaxing him closer and closer until their faces were mere inches apart. “Whenever I imagine myself visiting those places, I see myself with you. There is a… permanence to our relationship that I’ve come to realize lately. When I think of what my life will be in a year, you are there. In five, in ten, in twenty, you are there.”  


Aithlin brushed his fingertips over the hair at Dorian’s temples, lip bitten to keep from smiling a relieved and grateful smile.

“Your hair will by gray,” he whispered.  


Dorian did not keep his smile at bay. “So will yours.”

“And we’ll be together,” Aithlin said with some effort. The words were thick and clumsy in his mouth, no matter how happy they made him. Or, perhaps, because they made him so happy. “With our gray hair.”  


“Fucking in an aravel.”  


“Admiring modern Antivan architecture.”  


Dorian kissed him, suddenly, and stole his breath away.

“At home in Qarinus or in Arlathan or wherever we end up.” 


	7. dragonthorn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Slight emetophobia warning for the beginning. Also, blanket warning for body dysphoria and trans pregnancy throughout.

_ Peppermint steeped in hot water with calm an upset stomach. _

He could hear his mother’s voice between his ears, as if she was there, as if she was worrying over him as he wiped his mouth clean and leaned more heavily against the table that held the water basin. Nausea rolled over him again, and he tipped forward, eyes shut, knowing there was nothing left in him.  

Bile burned his throat. The acrid smell that came with it turned his stomach twice over, leaving him clutching the table to stay on his feet.

_ You may use a spoonful of honey to sweeten the tea, but only a spoonful. _

Behind him, Dorian sat upright in their bed, woken from a deep sleep to the sound of his lover emptying his stomach of its contents. There were eyes on him. Eyes, but not hands. Not yet. The man’s concern was middling. If he knew why the sickness hit him, things would be different.

_ It’s mild enough to be used during a pregnancy. _

Aithlin gagged, his brow furrowing when all that came out was a shuddering cough and a string of spit he quickly wiped away with his sleeve.

_ Recommended, even. For morning sickness. _

Once his stomach settled as much as it ever would, Aithlin pulled himself up onto mostly steady feet. He turned, still wiping at his mouth, cheeks and eyes red from exertion as much as his tears. There was something violent about vomiting, and no matter how many times it happened to him, he could never get used to it.

He crossed the cool stone floor to the foot of the bed, to the rich violet rug that ran along the end of it, and looked to Dorian, his expression pained and serious.

“Four times in almost as many days,” Aithlin said. His shoulders fell, sloping downward so pitifully that his shawl dropped to the join of his elbow. “I would be an idiot to not understand my own body. I know what this is. I’m not… ill.”

He swallowed, hard enough to be heard in the quiet of the room.

“I’m pregnant.”

Aithlin saw every ounce of air leave Dorian’s lungs. It was better than he expected, but anxiety churned his already sensitive stomach.

“Pregnant,” he heard his lover murmur. Dorian moved to sit on the edge of the bed, tucking the sheets around his hips to cover himself. “We… ought to have one of the doctors take a look at you, then, yes?” Dorian nodded to himself. “That… would be the sensible thing to do. Of course.”  


It was clear he was scared out of his mind.

Aithlin couldn’t tell if that was comforting or terrifying.

Rather than standing and stewing in the possibility of either being true, he moved to the side of the bed and stood in front of Dorian. There, he found a terrible quiet. Neither of them could speak, no matter how their lips twitched or how their eyes begged for understanding. This was the one thing they never anticipated. The _one_ thing.

Finally, after an age passed, Aithlin shook the stunned silence away. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, discomfort written in the tense angles of his limbs.

“I thought I was infertile.” The breath he took was sharp, and his expression twisted from shock to pain, lips curling sharply downward at the edges. With every moment and every word, his knees grew weaker. His heart pounded faster.

Before he could stop himself, he sank to his knees right there. “I thought this would never happen to me. I was such a _fool_. I was a fool, and now this—”

As his breath grew shorter and shorter and his vision threatened to blur, he felt a pair of warm, familiar hands pulling him to a warmer body.

“You _don’t_ have to carry this child.”

Aithlin grew still. Those weren’t the words he had expected. Comfort was the best option, and the worst being something he dared not think about with how emotional he already was. But for Dorian to tell him that he needn’t carry to term? That was not in the cards as he knew them.

Dorian ran his hands over the length of Aithlin’s back. “That was… sudden. What I _meant_ , was… I’ve become intimately aware of how you work over these years, amatus.” Aithlin felt his lover’s grip on him tighten. It always did when they spoke of love. “How you feel about your body, how that’s changed… you may not love it the way I do, but you’ve felt _much_ better of late.”

Feeling him pull away was painful. Breathing in felt like ice entered his lungs. Every inch apart made Aithlin fear it would be a permanent gap.

And then Dorian cupped his cheek.

“Having this child… I just wanted it made clear – your mental well-being. Your love of yourself and your body… I want that to take priority.” Somehow, Dorian managed to smile, soft and agonizingly sweet. “And not only because I’m horrified I’d be a terrible parent.”

“You wouldn’t be.”

The words were out of Aithlin’s mouth before he could even consider biting them back. His already flushed skin burned a deep red, and he pressed closer, the bridge of his nose resting against Dorian’s sternum.

His hands curled into the sheets around Dorian’s waist. After allowing himself time to breathe, he leaned up just enough to see Dorian with his chin tilted down, eyes warm, still smiling so gently.

“This child is _yours_ ,” Aithlin whispered, his voice small in his throat. “It is ours. The thought of… nnh.”

The words failed him. Speaking them seemed impossible, like they might cut his tongue in two, like they might damn them both. His eyes fell away from Dorian’s face, staring instead at the mess of pillows resting against the headboard of their bed.

It took another length of time to find his words, chosen carefully, whispered as before: “What do you want?”

Dorian’s soft hands once more guided him, forcing him to look into his eyes.

“I want…” It wasn’t new to hear Dorian’s voice tremble, but in this context, it made Aithlin’s heart wrench. “I _want_ a manor in Tevinter with paid servants and staff. I want a garden that I don’t have to tend, a laboratory to continue my work, and…”

He paused, letting his hands fall away.

The silence was maddening. Dorian looked away, almost bashful in his expression, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. It was _beautiful,_ and he had no right while Aithlin felt so sick to his stomach.

“…And if I could take you for a husband, _that_ would be everything I want,” Dorian finished, finally looking back to him. “I never thought of having children before. To me, it was always a sign of my duty, but now… I _am_ terrified of being a parent, but, ah… you’d be there to keep me from making a mistake too horrible.”

The smile that had just been at the corner of his mouth spread across his face like the slowly rising sun outside their many windows.

“If sleep deprivation comes for me, I might let our child wear plaidweave. I expect you to slap me.”

Aithlin laughed despite himself, a nervous bubble in his throat that left him pressed against Dorian’s chest again, squeezing the bedsheets in his fists, eager to look away from Dorian’s perfect smile. There was no way he could stare up at him and think at the same time, not when speaking was already so difficult.

“You wouldn’t think of it.” Aithlin shut his eyes, damp lashes catching against Dorian’s skin. “Even at your most exhausted, you would sooner die than clothe anyone in plaidweave short of your sworn enemies.”

He took a shallow breath before pressing a kiss to the warm skin beneath his mouth. It was a small thank you for Dorian’s humor, for his strange brand of comfort that was more comforting than anyone gave him credit for. Gratitude was unnecessary, but the knots in Aithlin’s stomach eased little by little with every passing moment. And that had everything to do with Dorian.

“Do you think I would be a good father?” Aithlin let the sheets go, let the tendons in his hands relax, and let the blood flow back into his knuckles. “Even with everything I’ve done wrong?”

Aithlin felt Dorian’s hand cover one of his own. The pad of his love’s thumb ran over his hand again and again.

“I have cherished memories with my father,” Dorian began. Where before his voice trembled, now it was simply tight, and Aithlin almost told him he didn’t need to speak. “While I had my tutors, my father would listen to my questions more than they ever would. He fed my curiosity, my ego, even my thirst for fashion.”

Aithlin felt Dorian’s lips meet the top of his head. He kissed his hair briefly.

“I am the man I am now because of him,” he admitted as slowly as he could. It was obvious that it hurt to reveal the truth, even to himself. “I wouldn’t be nearly so intelligent or determined if he hadn’t instilled those qualities in me.”

After a moment’s pause, Dorian curled his fingers around Aithlin’s biceps, pushing him back until their eyes could meet again. Aithlin felt his own eyes well at the sight of his lover’s damp gaze.

“No father was ever perfect, amatus,” he whispered. “No matter the goodness in their heart, no matter how much they love their children, they will make mistakes. I can… I can only hope that whatever mistakes _we_ make will be subject to mending.”

Dorian’s eyes glittered, and Aithlin’s felt his own burn.

“We’re already talking as if we know the answer,” he said, reaching up to hold onto Dorian’s arms with small, shaky hands. He blinked once and then again. His lashes clumped together with unshed tears. “We’re talking as if the child is already born, and it doesn’t feel… wrong.”

Aithlin let go of Dorian only to press his palms into the mattress on either side of his thighs, upper arms and shoulders straining to push himself onto his feet.

He felt hands along the curve of his waist again, touching him, _helping_ him to steady himself. And then he _was_ on his feet. He stood there, his own hands resting on Dorian’s shoulders, and felt the incessant knots in his stomach unravel themselves.

For the moment.

“My mother…” Aithlin’s unsteady feet carried him the inches he needed to sit beside Dorian at the edge of the bed. “She was a hunter, but she helped care for the other mothers in the clan. I remember her making tea for them when they were expecting.” He swallowed, but this time, it was softer. When he reached out to take Dorian’s hand, his own weren’t shaking. “Peppermint tea… with honey. Just a spoonful.”

He glanced at him from the corner of his eye, taking in a deep breath and releasing it with a sigh. “But I haven’t eaten anything in hours, and now my stomach is completely empty. Perhaps the tea can come with breakfast?”

Before Aithlin could finish his sentence, he felt his love’s lips on his cheek, inching to his ear.

“Vhenan…” Aithlin said in an _almost_ stern voice.

Dorian smile right before his lips met the shell of Aithlin’s sensitive ear murmuring a soft, “Ah, foiled…”  


Pulling back, he saw Dorian smile even more broadly, squeezing tightly onto his hand. “In all seriousness, we ought to get something light in your stomach, though I struggle to think of what breakfast food might combine well with _peppermint…”_

Aithlin’s brow furrowed in concentration. What he might find in the Pavus household’s larder was a mystery. He only knew what was brought to the table. For breakfast, Dorian’s mother dined on soft hard-boiled eggs and fruits from every corner of Tevinter.

The thought of eating an egg made his stomach turn, but fruit…

“Apricots,” Aithlin said, leaning into him and resting his chin on Dorian’s shoulder. “Rambutan, maybe? Or melon.”

The way Dorian perked up was almost enough to make him giggle.

Damn him.

“Rambutan, ah! Yes, yes; _of course_. That would be a pleasant combination…”

He stood, forgetting his modesty. It was sudden enough that Aithlin found himself looking away, only to look back at what was right in front of him.

Then he looked up.

“However, I don’t believe _cock_ and peppermint go together.” He smirked. “Believe me, I’ve tried.”

The color in Aithlin’s cheeks, having somewhat normalized over their conversation, returned with a vengeance, burning at his skin until it was a deep red. It wasn’t out of embarrassment; it was born from how tempted he was to take him into his mouth just then.

But there was a stale taste clinging to his teeth, one that demanded he pay attention to them when Dorian found his way to the kitchen for their breakfast.

“Get dressed,” Aithlin said, his words interwoven with a precious chuckle. “There isn’t a single modest bone in your body.”

His eyes snapped up to Dorian’s again. “Don’t say a word.”

As usual, Dorian put on a show.

A show of pressing his lips together, a show of bowing, and a show of walking over to their water basin to begin his morning ritual.

Aithlin’s eyes traveled over his lover’s body in appreciation. It was a pleasant distraction to focus on the swell of his bottom, and the way his wast overlapped his hips just slightly. Dorian’s muscles moved as he washed, he hummed a sweet tune, and Aithlin…

…Aithlin touched over his stomach.

A name popped into his head, but he’d save that for another time.

For now, it was enough to know that this was what he wanted.

His child, his love.

His home.


	8. arbor's blessing

“Follow the stream dripping down from the lake.”

Water bubbled over smooth stones. Sunlight filtered down to the forest’s soft floor through thousands of leaves, leaving the ground speckled with shifting, glittering gold. Aithlin lingered at the mouth of the lake, his boots sinking into the mud that lined it.

Iron Bull stopped to refill his canteen, and Cole squatted beside him to watch the brown-skinned nug washing its front paws in the stream. Its skin was stained deep red from a recent meal. So was its oddly shaped mouth.

“They’re different here,” he said, smiling as his fingers sifted blindly through the rocks at his feet. “But they sound the same.”

The nug looked up at Cole, disturbed by his sudden speech, and squeaked before running off down the stream. It kicked up pebbles as it hurried away, sinking them into the water, splashing with every agitated footfall.

Iron Bull handed his heavy canteen to the boy beside him with a lopsided smile tucked into the corner of his broad mouth. “Water sure as hell tastes different, though. Better.”

When Cole simply held the bottle in his hands, looking at it curiously, Bull laughed under his breath.

“Try it.”

Cole pressed his mouth to the nozzle of the canteen and tipped it back, drinking hungrily from it. Only when twin trickles of water curled around his chin did he pull it away, smacking his lips. “It _is_ good.” He weighed the bottle in his palms and quickly realized how much he’d drained from it. “I should… fill this back up.”

A ways off, Dorian stepped up beside Aithlin. His canteen was full of fresh water, resting on his hip, but when he spoke, his voice was dry, as if he hadn’t had a sip of the stuff all day.

“From what I’ve gathered,” he began, hands moving to the widest part of his hips, “we should be there soon.”

Aithlin nodded.

“We are an… hour off.” He glanced over his shoulder in Dorian’s direction. “We should arrive before nightfall.”

Dorian gave a low chuckle. “I can’t believe how nervous I am,” he said, tearing his eyes away from Aithlin’s scrutinizing expression in favor of the forest around them. He’d never seen this much green in all his life. The Emerald Graves were beautiful, if sorrowful. “You’ve done your best to assuage my fears, but there’s only so much you can be capable of, you know.”

“There isn’t anything to be afraid of,” Aithlin told him. There was something stilted in his tone, something that matched the rigid line of his back. “It isn’t as if their disapproval means anything.”

“How very typical of you.”

Dorian dusted away Aithlin’s long hair to plant a kiss to the nape of his neck. “Allow me my anxious feelings, won’t you? You can hardly save me from everything.”

Aithlin frowned, but he moved on. Dorian followed him without a word of complaint, as did Bull and Cole. There was no reason for any of them to protest. Eventually, they would rest. Eventually, they found make their way back to Fairbanks and his followers. Eventually, everything would be right as rain.

Until then, their leader remained silent, almost surly.

The composed distance that Aithlin kept was familiar to them all. Dorian was perhaps the most acquainted with it. He led them down the length of the stream and around an abandoned logging camp until they were met with a dirt road. They followed that road until it bled into a crossroads.

“Pass the crossroads and its dirt paths,” Aithlin murmured to himself, thumb brushing over his bottom lip as he stared up at the weathered post and the splintering signs that protruded from it in each split direction. There were three, and while the paint had faded to near-nothing, he knew what they said, where they led.

He glanced down the thickest, most well-kept road with another frown. Not there, despite the old wound that throbbed at the thought of following the dirt path to where it would bring him.

“Past the crossroads… to where?” Bull asked, hefting his greataxe higher on his shoulder with some effort. “In what direction?”

Aithlin shut his eyes in an effort to remember his clan’s movement through the Emerald Graves more clearly. “North,” he said after a time, pointing at two of the narrow signs. “Between these.”

Slipping past the signpost, he hopped over an outcropping of land and walked with the crossroads at his back. Just as before, the others followed without a word. They walked in relative silence. Occasionally, Dorian would point out a cluster of berries needed for a poultice or Cole would stop for a moment to commit a sight to memory.

The shadows were cool, but the places where sun reached down through the branches of trees loaned them enough warmth to continue even as daylight waned. Still, when they reached a clearing lined with thick, gnarled trunks of elm trees, Cole shivered, and not due to the cold.

Finally, Aithlin whispered: “Beneath the wych elm skirted with prophet’s laurel.”

Iron Bull, Cole, and Dorian were fell utterly silent when they realized just what they’d traveled all this way to find. Beneath the wych elm, there were unmistakable mounds of dirt. Some were larger than others, and some had already begun to grow grass.

Aithlin moved towards them as Bull set the bulky pack he carried down onto the ground. He stopped a yard off from the graves before kneeling there without a thought towards the silks and brocades wound around him for warmth.

“Cold in the shadow of the Graves,” Cole said, just barely loud enough for them to hear. “But home. They are home, and that’s what matters.”

“This is where we buried them,” Aithlin said, his voice gone thin. He smoothed both of his small hands in anxious patterns over the long scarf that dropped into his lap. “In unmarked graves, so they wouldn’t be disturbed.”

 _By the humans who killed them_.

The corners of Aithlin’s mouth twitched downward. “We will camp here.” He looked to Bull who stood at his side. “Take Cole with you to find something for dinner. There are deer… and ram. Cole might be able to find some sweet berries rather than medicinal ones.”

Bull nodded wordlessly before tugging an arm around Cole’s shoulders with a quiet, “Come on, kid.”

Rather than interrupting Aithlin’s dignified mourning, Dorian set about establishing the camp instead. He started a fire, brought out the hard cheese they’d been given upon leaving Fairbanks’s camp, and set up their tents.

All the while, Aithlin sat on the grass beneath the wych elm, arms curled around his waist and eyes focused on the large grave directly in front of him.

Bull told one of his many stories about the Chargers over dinner. This one was triumphant rather than bawdy, out of respect for their current location. Aithlin sat beside Dorian, close enough for their shoulders to touch, and he ate just enough to keep hunger at bay.

No one had the heart to keep the fire burning too much longer. They found their way to their tents for sleep. Exhaustion—both physical and emotional—brought rest on quickly for Aithlin.

But it didn’t stick.

Hours after the fire died, when the moon was at its highest and its brightest in the sky above the canopy of trees, Aithlin woke to Dorian stirring beside him. He felt his lover’s careful movements—the gentle folding back of his blanket, the rustle of his robes, the patient untying and retying of the tents closures, the faint clink of an unlit lamp, the quiet crunch of fallen leaves underfoot.

Aithlin chose not to follow him. The temptation was there, but he had more reason to wait and to listen. Curiosity eclipsed all else.

Dorian stopped moving not far off from the camp, and after a moment, Aithlin heard him kneel. There was a murmured spell and just after a pale light bloomed to life within the glass panels of the lamp.

“Hello.”

Aithlin’s brow furrowed.

For whatever reason, Dorian’s awkward introductions continued in the quiet around them, a hurried whisper meant to only be heard by two people. Or, perhaps, one.

“Aithlin has told me about all of you.” Another crunch of leaves followed, and Aithlin could just imagine Dorian shifting uncomfortably on his knees in front of the mounds of dirt. He smiled against his own arm, tucked under his head, heart feeling in that moment as if it would burst.

“Elanil—he wanted me to know that you were the clan’s most talented ranger. Every time he speaks of you, his face scrunches up, as if he’s trying to fight off how jealous he still is of you.”

“Venali—he thought you were beautiful. He says that you carried yourself with grace, even when swinging a sword. I can imagine that he’s taken after you.”

Dorian’s voice thickened.

In the quiet of the Graves, he unearthed a sincerity that sounded almost foreign in his mouth. It was beautiful.

“Kellam—he wishes he’d known you better, that he hadn’t kept you at arm’s length for so long. Esyae—he still wears the charm you made for him when he was a boy on the cord around his neck. Jastra—he tried his best to be a good student, and he feels like he never quite managed that.”

Beneath his thick blanket, beneath the tent’s canvas ceiling, Aithlin pressed his hands to his mouth to keep from making a sound. His pale lashes clumped together, and his cheeks burned hot with tears.

He’d listened. Those nights, when Aithlin bared pieces and parts of himself to Dorian, he’d listened.

“And Ralnor…”

Aithlin’s eyes snapped open, his vision blurred, and he strained to hear Dorian above the pounding of his heart.

“You must have known,” he said with a little, wet laugh. “You had to have known what a beautiful son you raised. You had to have known how lucky you were, and… ah.” Dorian sniffed. Aithlin let out a quiet whine that was muffled by the tent that surrounded him. “You should know that Aithlin counts himself fortunate to have been raised by you.”

Dorian cleared his throat and shifted again on the leaves. He repeated the incantation from before, and the lamplight grew.

“Sometimes, I wonder what sort of man I might have grown into had I been born into a family such as yours. What would I have become if my father supported me the way you supported Aithlin?”

He took a deep breath and let go of a deep sigh. “I can’t tell you how glad I am that he had you.”

“If anyone could have such a loving father…” Dorian cleared his throat again following the false start, following his voice breaking in two. When he began again, his voice was stronger. “If anyone deserved to be treated with such care as a boy and as a young man, it is him.

“So, what I’m attempting and failing to say is… Thank you. He saved my life, as you saved his.”

The lamplight flickered as a long moment of quiet passed.

“In a roundabout way, I believe that means you saved me, too.”


	9. dragon's blood

The pain was unbearable some days.  
  
On those days, the pain grew and grew upwards from his palm and into his wrist and forearm. On those days, his fingers were useless. On those days, he refused to leave his bedroom above Skyhold.   
  
The last thing Aithlin wanted to give the steady stream of nobles - _Fereldan, Orlesian, Nevarran, Marcher_ \- in the main hall was a show of how vulnerable he was on those days. In him they would see weakness. The seed would not only be planted; it would take root in an instant, spreading over the soil like kudzu.  
  
He preferred them thinking of him as a misanthrope, a dangerous recluse who rarely left his room. There were rumors of the anchor’s pain, but they were dashed away by those whose opinion of him was unshakable. The only whispers that held any weight in their little court were of Dorian, who often wandered straight through clusters of the curious and headed to the simple door at the back of the room.  
  
Everyone knew where the door led, none better than Dorian.  


Aithlin heard the door open at the bottom of the twisting stairwell leading up to his tower in the sky, and he waited, shutting his eyes to focus on the footfalls that followed. There were heels, which narrowed down the choice of visitor considerably. Only when he took the quickness of the visitor’s step into account was he able to choose between Josephine and Dorian.  
  
He sat up in bed, drawing his quilt around his shoulders and up to his neck, the wretched throb of the anchor nestled against his chest. Greeting Dorian with a small, if tired smile was a more appealing concept than having Dorian walk in on him hunched over on the mattress, forehead pressed into his palm, silently begging for some relief.  
  
“Aithlin?” A dark head popped up between the wooden columns of the banister that separated his room from the stairwell. He was more cheerful than usual. Aithlin knew that meant ruining his morning. Even the thought exhausted him, turned his stomach. “Ah, good. You’re awake.”  
  
Aithlin gave a strained laugh, and Dorian’s brow furrowed in concern as he took the last half-dozen steps needed for him to reach the top.   
  
“Part of me wishes I’d walked in on you sleeping.”  
  
Without a word, Aithlin let the quilt fall away from his throat and lifted his hand, palm held in Dorian’s direction. The man gasped and hurried the rest of the way to the bed, climbing into it without a second thought.  
  
Dorian curled his fingers around his wrist, gently coaxing the split and glowing skin closer to his eyes.  
  
“I have not… ah.” Aithlin shook his head. “I have not slept. Not since midnight.”  
  
“Then I _truly_ wish I had walked in on you sleeping.” A sympathetic thumb rubbed over the fleshiest part beneath his thumb, eliciting a whine from the Inquisitor. The sound struck Dorian like a blow; Aithlin could see that much from the sudden tension in his expression, the downward turn of his lips. “The skin is inflamed. More so than usual. Like I mentioned the last time you felt this way, your body is likely trying its damnedest to fight the anchor.”  
  
Aithlin nodded, his eyes falling from Dorian’s face to the hand he held. He remembered the last conversation they had over the anchor as clear as day. Every twinge of pain reminded him of it.  
  
 _Is there ever a time when you feel_ ** _no_ **_pain?_  
  
 _There isn’t._  
  
His vision blurred. The sickly green Fadelight of the anchor curled outwards from his palm, leaving him in diluted tendrils. Before long, everything he saw was tinged with green. Wet, faded green.   
  
Then, he blinked.  
  
The tears fell away, and so did the color.  
  
“In my… time as the Inquisitor,” Aithlin began, fatigue causing him to trip and stumble, “the weight- ah, the weight of it all never bothered me. I took to being a leader. It’s everything I have ever- ever wanted. I am not a mage, so I- I can never be a Keeper. I can never lead- mmh. Fuck.”  
  
Without looking up, he knew Dorian watched him, watched every quiet word that left his mouth. He also knew how badly he wanted to wipe away his tears. But he waited instead, cupping the underside of Aithlin’s hand, and listened.  
  
“I can never lead my clan.”  
  
The words left his mouth like so many handfuls of iron, clumsy and heavy and horrible. “So I wanted… this. I wanted to give them what I could. Being the Inquisitor was- it was an opportunity for me.”  
  
This time, he did look to Dorian. He looked at him around his tears, and he saw that Dorian watched him with an undeniable awe as well as concern rather than apart from it. There was no disconnect, no split between his emotions. His eyes were full of love and worry and respect, and they were so perfectly stormy.  
  
Aithlin knew he was wrong in that moment. Dorian didn’t want to wipe away his tears, even when given ample opportunity. He wanted to know what lay behind them.   
  
“I have… _dealt_ with so much pain. I have dealt with so many different kinds. I have hated every inch of myself, inward and outward. Grief… fear - of humans, of failure, of myself and what- what I’m capable of. There is so much pain in grief and fear.” Aithlin pressed his lips together, exhaustion a thousand times heavier on his shoulders than his grandfather’s quilt. But even that slipped as he leaned into Dorian, baring the freckled skin and the twitching muscles of his left arm. “But no- nothing ever lingered as long as this.”  
  
Eyes shut and breathing uneven, he felt Dorian’s warm hand brush his pale hair away and close over the nape of his neck. It moved in a measured pace, slowly following a few inches of his spine up and down in time with the breaths he should be taking.  
  
And slowly, it became easier to keep up with him. Aithlin inhaled and exhaled with Dorian’s comforting touch, and when he spoke, his voice wasn’t louder, but stronger.  
  
“I want the pain to be gone.”  
  
“Perhaps it will?” Dorian gathered Aithlin closer to him and pressed a kiss atop his head. “When you’ve defeated Corypheus once and for all, perhaps the anchor will mend itself. We have no way of knowing, true, but… it makes sense, doesn’t it?”  
  
Aithlin whispered, quiet against the skin of Dorian’s collarbone, “I do not know. I have no way of knowing.”  
  
“Mm, well, neither do I, but I _would_ call it an educated guess. The anchor exists as a way to seal the rifts scattered here and there thanks to the Breach, yes? Once you seal the Breach fully and deal with the horrible creature causing all of these problems, the anchor will be useless, which might induce a sort of healing process. It makes a great deal of narrative sense, as well.”  
  
As he spoke, Dorian curled his fingers around Aithlin’s wrist and brought the palm of his hand to his mouth. His kisses were light over the tender flesh, lighter over the anchor itself. There was no fear in him, only understanding.  
  
“I’ll get something for us to eat,” he said, lips moving against Aithlin’s fingertips. “And fetch some writing supplies from my room for when you’re able to rest.”  
  
“Vhenan… I don’t want to take-”  
  
“Amatus,” Dorian said, smiling, “you are not taking anything. I am giving you my time willingly.”  
  
Aithlin gave a small, almost imperceptible nod. Learning to accept this sort of affection was almost as difficult for him as showing it was for Dorian, but they were both improving over time. The love between them made it much easier.  
  
Dorian gave his fingertips one last, parting kiss before leaving to raid the kitchens.  
  
The pulsing, blinding pain was still there.  
  
But rather than spending hours alone in his suffering, he knew that in half an hour’s time Dorian would be back again, with his warm hands and his warm lips, and the pain would not be as insurmountable.


	10. ambrosia

Aithlin hitched the fur he wore farther up his shoulders, one hand curled into a white-knuckled fist to keep the shawl still as he emerged onto the balcony with an empty bowl. Snow fell sideways and left Skyhold blanketed in quiet and white. There was no one brave enough to face the cold save for the Inquisitor, and even then, only for a moment.  
  
The chill hit him first, shooting up from his bare feet and into his bones. He cursed under his breath - a ribbon of colorful words that amused the man lounging in bed behind him.   
  
Dorian’s laugh was warm, but not warm enough to keep Aithlin from shivering violently as he began to scoop the snow up from the banister and dispensed the handfuls into the bowl. Precious moments passed before he all but hurled himself back into the bedroom, flinging the door closed with a hooked ankle.  
  
“One of these days,” Dorian began, sprawling out over the mattress in order to retrieve his book from the bedside table, “you’ll do that, and the glass will shatter into a thousand thousand pieces.”  
  
Aithlin shrugged as he climbed up into the bed. Snow melted between his toes, in his pale blond hair. He shoved the bowl in Dorian’s direction. “Keep this cold.”  
  
Rather than feigning ignorance or unwillingness, Dorian coiled his fingers, and in an instant, a frost formed around the rim of the wooden dish. “What are you going to do?” he asked, one brow arched as he began to leaf through the book with his free hand to find where he left off the previous night. “Is this your breakfast?”  
  
The question was poised as a joke, evident in the way his mustache curled with the smile he wore and the words curled around his clever tongue.

“Ours,” Aithlin said without glancing back over his shoulder.  
  
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed,  _amatus_ , but my tastes are refined.” His book resting against his thigh, Dorian watched as Aithlin rifled through the breakfast they were brought only minutes before by a sheepish and flush-faced serving lady. “Too refined by far to scoop snow into my mouth by the palmful.”  
  
The Inquisitor did not budge. He did not flinch or fight back. In fact, all he did was reach for the sugar meant for their tea and the date jam meant for the bread that had been served in the bowl that was now full of snow.  
  
“I don’t know how this tastes with sugar,” Aithlin admitted once he returned to Dorian’s side, sitting with folded legs on the bed in his many pastel-colored layers. He rubbed his cheek over his shoulder as he considered the tiny spoon in his hand and the small mound of sugar he scooped out just before. “Orlesians tend to keep more sugar in the summer months, and what little sugar we were able to steal or trade for was used for medicine. and preservation.”  
  
Dorian set his book aside again, his newfound interest in what Aithlin was doing turned towards the tiny spoon and the bowl of powdery snow. “So, you used fruit,” he offered and smiled to himself when Aithlin nodded.  
  
After taking a deep breath, Aithlin dumped the spoon of sugar into the mound of ice. Magic kept the flakes from melting in the warmth of the fireplace. He watched as the sweet dust spilled over - white on white - and wondered how it might taste. Crunchier, surely. Sweeter. Honey might have been a better choice, but they hadn’t been served honey.  
  
“You’ll have the first bite, won’t you?” Dorian asked.  
  
Aithlin shifted his attention from their breakfast to his lover’s eyes, pale green staring guilelessly into stormy gray. And without the inflection of a joke, he said, “If you are not brave enough.”  
  
“ _Brave_?” Dorian laughed. If anything could melt the enmagicked snow, it was his laugh. “Why would I need to be brave? Surely, if you’ve gone out of your way to make this for us both, it must be delicious. You should be leaping at the opportunity to gorge yourself before passing the spoon!”  
  
That very spoon pressed into the date jam without a glimmer of fanfare. The jellied texture peeled away from the smooth wood before plopping down onto the snow in a mound of amber, chunks of date visible through the semi-opaque substance.   
  
Flakes clung to the sticky mouthful of jam, just as the jam itself clung to Aithlin’s bottom lip once he licked the spoon clean.  
  
Dorian leaned in and licked the corner of his mouth.  
  
“Well, the jam is delicious,” he teased as Aithlin forced him away with an overwhelmed laugh. “What do we do now that you’ve wasted perfectly good sugar and perfectly good jam?”  
  
Aithlin pressed the spoon into the snow. He cradled the bowl in his hand, so focused on the contents he didn’t notice how cold the dish had become as time went on. He was showing off, of course. Or, perhaps, he was unable to cast so minute a spell, given how powerful he was. Not that he’d ever imply such a thing when Dorian was within earshot.  
  
As he mixed the snow and the sugar and the jam, they folded into each other. White became tan became a rich yellow-brown. Still cold, with the snowflakes still intact.  
  
Dorian loomed over the bowl wearing a curious expression. “It looks...”  
  
“Awful,” Aithlin finished with a laugh. “Unappetizing. I knew it would be brown, but this looks... disgusting.”  
  
Dorian glanced up from the unfortunate mixture.  
  
“Perhaps the taste will surprise us.”  
  
Scooping up a spoonful of the flavored snow, Aithlin offered the utensil to him. It took a while for Dorian to relent, but when he did, he snatched the spoon away with a dignified huff. The snow threatened to hurl itself out of the spoon, but it remained still, only loosing a few flakes of snow that melted the moment they hit the fabric of his robe.  
  
“Since you’ve become the optimist,” Aithlin said, watching with no twinge of jealousy and no complaints as Dorian lifted the spoon to his mouth and parted his lips. “I... hope you enjoy it.”  
  
Guileless, again.   
  
Aithlin Ghilain was no master manipulator. He told no lies and curbed no truths. And seeing him there, legs folded, staring at him with all the eagerness of a child searching for praise was almost too much for Dorian to bear.  
  
So he shoved the spoon into his mouth and chewed the flakes between his teeth.   
  
The sugar hadn’t fully melted, giving his teeth something to grind against as the jammy snow melted on his tongue. Three words came to him, one right after the other - cold, crisp, candied. Never before had something indulged his sweet tooth without making him feel terrible afterward.   
  
“Do you want the truth?” Dorian asked, hoping that his expression wouldn’t betray him.   
  
Aithlin narrowed his eyes, only a little. Candlelight still flickered in the darkest parts of them. “Yes.”  
  
“It’s wonderful.” Dorian scooped up another mouthful and offered the taste to the man at his side. He pressed the curved edge against Aithlin’s bottom lip. “Have some.”  
  
Only after another suspicious look did Aithlin open his mouth, and Dorian watched with a besotted look in his eyes as he chewed, as he tasted, as his cheeks warmed, as he sat up straighter to whisper a soft, “Oh.”  
  
“Tomorrow, have them bring up pear preserves.” Dorian smiled to himself as Aithlin took another bite, then another. “And two bowls rather than one.”  
  
Aithlin crawled closer to him, still holding the frosted bowl close to his chest as he did. After a while, he passed him the spoon and settled his head on Dorian’s shoulder, watching as he hummed in pleasure around the wide spoon.   
  
Even as his palms froze and gooseflesh rose on his arms, Aithlin felt warmer than he ever had.   
  
Every time he reached out to Dorian and found the man willing to indulge him, another bundle of kindling was added to the already formidable bonfire in his chest. Every time Dorian reacted to his customs or his stories with a curious smile, he fell more in love.  
  
“I’ve heard that snow can be added to wine,” Aithlin murmured.   
  
A smile burst forth on his lips when Dorian made the most wretched noise of affront the moment he spoke.  
  
“And dilute the vintage?” Dorian asked. He curled an arm around Aithlin’s shoulders and brought him in closer, burying his nose into snow-damp hair. “That you will never sell me on. I can promise you.”  
  
Aithlin didn’t care. He nestled into the crook of Dorian’s arm, and Dorian fed him spoonfuls of dates and enmagicked snow, and he felt happier than he ever had been.

 


End file.
